5 reasons why PR interns shouldn’t be pitching the media

If you’re lucky enough to be hiring a PR intern this summer, don’t fall into the trap of letting them learn on the client’s nickel.

There’s a good discussion at the Get Social PR blog where Rodger Johnson, a PR counselor and blogger, argues in favor of letting interns pitch, with supervision.

“Interns need to learn how to pitch and the best way to do that is to pitch,” he says.

I disagree.

Here are seven reasons why interns shouldn’t be pitching the media:

Pitching is difficult enough for PR people who have been doing it for many years. It’s the one skill that takes most professionals several years to learn, and several more to hone.

Most interns, who don’t know the client’s company intimately, are ill-equipped to answer a reporter’s question about the client. An intern who’s caught off-guard might not know how to respond, particularly if the question deals with a bad-news situation on a topic that’s a lot juicier than the topic of the pitch.

Put yourself in the client’s place. What would you think if you knew that an amateur college student was representing you and your brand in front of the media and bloggers?

Guarding and protecting the client’s reputation is a lot more important than letting an intern stumble and fall and “learn from the experience.”

Pitching is all about building relationships with the media. Interns typically arrive in May or June and they’re gone by September. Work on building the relationships between the media and YOU.

Am I wrong?

Do you let interns pitch with supervision? What kinds of results have you seen? And what do you tell your client about the process?

About Joan Stewart

Publicity expert Joan Stewart, a PR mentor aka The Publicity Hound, works with small business owners who need free publicity to promote their expertise. She shows you how to establish your credibility, enhance your reputation, position yourself as an expert, and sell more products and services. To receive her free DIY publicity tips twice a week, subscribe here. See all the ways you can work with Joan. Or contact her and ask a burning question about PR, self-promotion or social media.

Comments

Joan, thanks for taking up the other side with valid points. I’ll tackle the last point here. You’re absolutely right that “pitching is all about building relationships with the media.” And there is no question, building those relationships takes time, that’s why interns should start early.

It’s also quite possible to build those relationships (or at least set a firm foundation) within a summer internship. If interns come back for a second or third summer job, those media relationships will have already been built and new ground work toward professionalization can continue.

Joan, I’m glad you took up the other side too. It’s a good discussion and I’m looking forward to what journalists say. From my background in journalism, I didn’t care who pitched me as long as it was a good pitch. But that’s me and I’m not a journalist anymore. Which SM sites are you targeting for this discussion?

I think I agree. As an intern, I have had to pitch to the media quite a few times. I always feel like I’m throwing out blindly.

If a company lets an intern pitch, they should have the supervisor there to help because interns need to know more about who I’m pitching to so I can decide my approach. Or perhaps who to pitch to within a certain media group (maybe one reporter favors certain kinds of stories or likes my company).

As far as answering reporter’s questions, that is no problem because I received excellent training for that in college. So for me the main issue is not knowing enough about who I’m pitching to!

You make a valid point. I never advocate throwing interns into the fire with first giving them an fire resistant suit. Training is important, as is having a manager to oversee your first few pitches. I would equate it to learning how to fly an airplane. If I was given the helm of an aircraft without an instructor beside me, I would crash the plane before it got off the ground. The same is true for media training.

I think you make many fair points. Most interns are not familiar enough with client accounts to be pitching to the media, and a client’s reputation far is too important to be taking a chance on. But who says you have to give your intern a pitch with so much influence or controversy?

I have worked on a few accounts over the past two months, and I’ve been given a chance to pitch/follow up on some more lighthearted, or subordinate, topics and events. Last week I followed up with a reporter who had not received our release about an event, so I explained the nature of the event and why it was significant to the community. Sunday morning, the reporter’s story was on the front page of our local news section.

I’ve learned so much as an intern this summer, but only because I’ve been given real responsibilities. No one’s asking or expecting you to give your intern a pitch that is “juicy” or “a bad-news situation;” but there’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to trust your intern, for example, to pitch an event photo or coverage of an employee success when it come to an account they’ve spent a lot of time with. And if you can’t entrust your intern with those kind of responsibilities, then you probably shouldn’t have hired that person as an intern in the first place.

To a degree, I think both views are right: The best way to learn to pitch is by pitching, but the client’s reputation should be at the forefront of your mind.

I’m a recent graduate of a PR program and a current communications intern and I have to respectfully disagree.

All of the assumptions made here really underestimate the value that an intern can bring to an organization or agency.

Like you said, pitching is an “art” that takes several years to hone – but then, everyone (including the intern) has got to start somewhere. So where do we draw the line? If an intern is never allowed to pitch, then you’d be getting entry-level employees who have zero pitching experience… what makes them any different from an intern, aside from the title?

If your intern doesn’t know your client or organization intimately enough to be able to speak on their behalf, I’d argue the orientation and training process is seriously flawed.

Allowing interns to pitch doesn’t mean allowing them to have free reign over your clients. It means providing interns with a positive and supportive learning environment to foster their growth as a PR practitioner. This means adequate training and practice before putting an intern on the phone with the media as well as proper supervision.

I would hope that most interns are brought into an organization with potential for further employment. Perhaps the idea of using interns on a rotating basis is the root of the problem: an intern isn’t expected to stay long, so they aren’t properly debriefed on the client and as such, they aren’t trusted with responsibilities like pitching.

I am a seasoned business person (25years) with experience as a business owner in real estate, retail and have utilized many forms of marketing over those years.
I am also interning (with thesparkleagency.com under @Debbie_h2o) right now in order to educate myself to be more effective in the use of social media marketing; I have decided to pursue a career devoted to marketing, as opposed to utilizing marketing as part of my career.
A large part of the education process is interacting with potential clients: participating in meetings, researching, SWOT analyses, etc. But the other major component is the ability for the intern to gain the knowledge necessary to pitch from their mentor/employer.
The responsibility falls to the employer to be confident in the abilities of their intern should an intern pitch be an option.
I find that the ‘Catch-22’ effect comes into play. An example (we’re experiencing right now at home) is youth employment – my 15 year old can’t find work because he has no labour experience, but he can’t get the experience unless he works. How does the intern gain the experience and self-confidence necessary to pitch a client without pitching a client?

Hi Joan. You are absolutely on target. When meeting a prospective client for the first time I always ask what are the main issues with their prior agency. Potential clients that have not had an agency generally have the same opinion based on what they’ve been told by industry experts.

The #1 issue across the board is having junior employees or interns working on their account particularly without senior supervision.

Yes, junior people/interns need to learn how to pitch journalists. What I have done over the years with this level employee is have them practice with me before I turn them loose. There is so much to do at an agency without interfacing with client and media. Of course junior employees should attend client meetings to learn how it is done, same with interviews and media contact. Clients want to build trust with junior employees so that the straightforward work they need accomplished does not have to wait for a senior employee.

It pays to find out what clients expectations are before entering into a contract. Paying heed to what a potential client articulates will serve the agency and the client in the long run.

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